Dear Readers,
Despite considerable efforts in many developing countries, through national blindness prevention programs, the global number of blind and visually disabled seems to be growing, mainly as an effect of population increase and aging. Thus, the most recent (1997) projected estimate for world blindness points to some 45 million blind, and an additional 135 million visually disabled (low vision). About 80% of blindness is avoidable (preventable or curable), and 90% of the world's blind live in a developing country.

The main causes of blindness are cataract (47.8%), glaucoma (12.3%) and age related macular, degeneration (8.7%). Other causes include corneal opacity (5.1%), diabetic retinopathy (4.8%), childhood blindness (3.9%), trachoma (3.6%), onchocerciasis (0.8%). Globally, about 85% of all visual impairment and 75% of blindness could be prevented or cured worldwide. But the most important statistic to understand is that over 75% of the world's blind people could see again if they had access to adequate eye care services. More than 75% of the worlds blindness is preventable or treatable. Approximately 90% of the worlds blind people live in developing countries. Blindness more often affects older people.

About 314 million people are visually impaired worldwide, 45 million of them are blind. Most people with visual impairment are older, and females are more at risk at every age, in every part of the world. About 87% of the world's visually impaired live in developing countries. The number of people blinded by infectious diseases has been greatly reduced, but age-related impairment is increasing. Cataract remains the leading cause of blindness globally, except in the most developed countries. Correction of refractive errors could give normal vision to more than 12 million children (ages five to 15).About 85% of all visual impairment is avoidable globally.

This paper presents estimates of the prevalence of visual impairment and its causes in 2002, based on the best available evidence derived from recent studies. This study provides the overview of Age-specific prevalence of blindness and number of blind people, by age and WHO sub regions, 2002 and it also provide the total number population, number of blind and low vision people, prevalence blindness and low vision and number of persons visually impaired in WHO subregion, 2002.

This study was conducted to identify the potential effect on global economic productivity of successful interventions that are planned as part of the VISION 2020 right to sight initiative. The initiative aims to eliminate avoidable blindness

This article is aimed to summarize the Global Initiative for the Elimination of Avoidable Blindness. It focuses on a few priority disorders, and on what action needs to be taken from now to the year 2020, in terms of disease control, human resource development and infrastructure strengthening and appropriate technology development for eye care delivery.

This article gives a brief overview of historical, clinical and therapeutic aspects and updates epidemiological data on cataracts in the world. It also provides insight into political, socio-economic, and cultural factors adversely affecting care availability in developing countries thus making cataracts a major public health problem and an obstacle for development. Finally this article offers a few recommendations for reducing the backlog of cataracts in the world.

Around 18% of the world's blind population live in Africa and cataract accounts for half of cases. There is less than one ophthalmologist for every one million people in Africa and less than 10% of those requiring eye surgery actually receive it.
Around 1% of Africans are blind. Around 7.1 of the world's 38 million blind people live in sub-Saharan Africa Around 60% of Africa's blind are women (Lewallen and Courtright. Blindness in Africa: present situation and future needs. Around 50% of blindness in sub-Saharan Africa is due to cataract. An estimated 2.2 million Africans are blind due to trachoma. There are an estimated 300,000 blind children in Africa. Africa has 1 ophthalmologist per 1,000,000 population. The prevalence of blinding cataract in sub-Saharan Africa is around 0.5%

This article was done to estimate the prevalence of blindness and low vision, identify the main causes of blindness and low vision, and estimate targets for blindness prevention programs in Mankien payam (district), southern Sudan

The aim of the study was to calculate the gender distribution of trichiasis cases in trachoma communities in Vietnam and Tanzania, and the gender distribution of surgical cases, to determine if women are using surgical services proportional to their needs

This article highlights that women are more prone to Trachoma due to various reasons. Here we have examples which show how trachoma program can address the particular needs of women while designing interventions aimed at eliminating blinding trachoma in the community as a whole.

A qualitative study was conducted in the Department of Ophthalmology to identify and understand the barriers that women face in accessing cataract surgery in and around Cape Town urban areas and what steps to be taken to overcome these barriers.

The aim of this study was to conduct a Rapid Assessment for Avoidable Blindness to estimate the magnitude and causes of visual impairment in people aged = 50 y in the post conflict area of the Western Province of Rwanda, which includes one-quarter of the population of Rwanda.

The Eye Care Programme in the Eastern Highlands, known as Goroka Eye Unit, is based at the provincial hospital in Goroka, the capital of Eastern Highlands Province, Papua New Guinea. The project is in partnership with the Christian Brothers, PNG.

A survey was conducted to determine the prevalence and causes of blindness in Anambra State of Nigeria to provide baseline data for the planning, implementation and evaluation of both the states and the National Programme for Prevention of Blindness, which suggested that the priority needs in Anambra State are sight restorative surgery for the cataract blind, early diagnosis and treatment of glaucoma, and provision of low-cost spectacles for the correction of ametropia. A community outreach eye care service, integrated into primary health care, was recommended.

By age 65, one in three Americans has some form of vision impairing eye disease. Of the 119 million people in the United States who are age 40 or over, 3.4 million are visually impaired or blind. This level of blindness and visual impairment costs more than $4 billion annually in benefits and lost income. People with diabetes are 25 times more likely to become blind than people without diabetes. Glaucoma is one of the leading causes of blindness in the United States, and the most common cause of blindness among African Americans and Hispanics. Nearly three million people have glaucoma, but half do not realize it because there are often no warning symptoms.

More than 20 million Americans report experiencing significant vision loss.The exact figure from the 2006 National Health Interview Survey was 21.2 million Americans who reported experiencing vision loss.

Paraguay established a National VISION 2020 Committee, officially recognized by the government, in 2002. Where different institutions and the Ministry of Health signed the VISION 2020 Global Declaration. This committee brought together previously diverse public and private institutions, each working on their own to address eye care needs, but with little coordination or shared purpose between them.

This project has been initiated by co-worker Henselmeyer from the Grace Children Hospital, P579, in the late 90's as an outreach program. Meanwhile it was extended by Dr. Ritza Eugene and Dr. Guerline Roney.

This report was made by the Aid Association for the Blind of the District of Columbia. The report is based on a statistical analysis that was funded by Guide Dogs for the Blind and The Seeing Eye. In an effort to learn more about Americans with disabilities, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) decided that the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) would be used to gather information about men, women, and children with disabilities living all across the country.

The purpose of the national survey was to estimate the burden of visual loss and blindness due to cataract in people aged 50 years and over in Paraguay. There is a need to increase the cataract surgical coverage in Paraguay. And the conclusion was that the number of eye surgeons is adequate but the accessibility of cataract surgical services in rural areas and the affordability of surgery to large sections of society are major constraints.

The World Health Organization (WHO) definition of blindness is a visual acuity of less than 3/60 (20/200, 0.05), and low vision is less than 6/18 (20/50, 0.3) in the better eye with the best correction. In the eastern Mediterranean countries , there are several studies on the prevalence of blindness. Certain studies were community based prevalence surveys while others included reports on blindness from registries of schools for the blind. The prevalence of blindness in Lebanon is 0.6% and 1.5% in Saudi Arabia. The leading causes of blindness have been determined by information retrieved from registries for the blind in a number of countries. In general, data obtained from hospitals, social security records, or institutions for the blind may give us an idea about the causes of blindness but these sources suffer from certain limitations. Often excluded from consideration are remote populations, those who do not seek medical advice, unilateral blindness, older individuals, and preschool children.

In countries in the eastern Mediterranean eye diseases have long been recognised as a major health problem. In Saudi Arabia, a community based blindness survey was conducted to determine the prevalence of blindness and visual impairment and to assess the prevalence of the major causes of blinding eye disease.

This article is about a NGO called ORBIS in the Eastern Mediterranean region which provided the eye care services to the common people. In September 2005, ORBIS became the first international health-related, non-governmental Organization (NGO) to work in Libya since international sanctions was imposed in 1992. Years of poor relations with the West contributed significantly to a lack of training in essential subspecialties for Libyas ophthalmic community.

A project was done to know the reason behind why womens in Egypt are not using the eye care services as frequently as men. Although this intervention focused on women, men also benefited. People should be supported in seeking services, for example by helping them with transport. Health systems should also be strengthened to absorb the increased demand for services. And the project was successful because it combined health education, capacity building of local providers, and breaking down of barriers in a single, integrated programme.

In this article they have emphasized on Pakistan situation where because of the cultural barrier a huge part of the population are not able to access the eye care service. So they have trained many Lady Health worker who visits to the each and every house of the area allotted to them. And as a result they found that lady health workers dealt with more than three times as many eye patients as colleagues in other provinces who had not yet received the training

South-East Asia and the Western Pacific region, as determined by the World Health Organization, have the greatest need for assistance for vision impairment and blindness in the world.

The solution to giving sight to the people of these regions involves having enough eye health personnel to treat them. The ICEE strategy is to create a range of education models that can train the various kinds of eye care personnel necessary to manage this task. The models are comprehensive education programmes that possess all the necessary information, implementation guidelines and course manuals to train eye health workers in the knowledge and skills necessary to provide a particular eye care service.

All ICEE activities eye examinations, dispensing glasses, training eye care workers, negotiating with governments provide data that contributes to the development of these models. Specific research projects are undertaken to investigate different aspects of eye care delivery systems as well as the efficacy of training models, in order to create more effective eye care delivery systems.

This study was conducted in the districts of Karnataka to analyze the barriers for the cataract. The data of the previously conducted study has compared with current data and the study resulted in finding the shift in the barriers. These shifts are analyzed and alternative strategies to increase the uptake of cataract surgery are recommended.

This was presented by Mr. R.P.Kandel in Global Consultation on Reaching the Unreached which was held at Madurai from October 6th to 8th, 2007. This is a presentation on District Eye Care Service Lumbini Model, Nepal.

This study was done to determine sex inequalities in cataract blindness and surgical services in south India. Eye care programmes in this population need to be sensitised to the substantial reduction in blindness possible by achieving equal surgical coverage between sexes.

Cataract remains the leading cause of vision impairment in most countries in the Western Pacific region. This is similar to most of the world's economic regionsIndia, China, sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, the Middle Eastern crescent, and other Asia and islands. In countries included in the established market economy grouping, such as Japan and Australia, age related retinal disease is the most common cause of blindness. The transition from where cataract predominates as a major cause of vision loss to one where age related retinal disease accounts for most vision loss results from both high cataract surgery rates in these countries but also the ageing of the population. Japan has the oldest population of any country with males and females expecting to live on average for 75 or 82 years.

This article briefs about the services of the Cambodias National Eye Care Programme and Vision2020 Right to the sight services for the prevention of blindness. This include to provide eye care services in each region of Cambodia and to reduce blindness.

The white cane is now recognised as the blind person's mobility aid the world over. Ever since US President Lyndon S. Johnson first proclaimed it in 1964, White Cane Day has become the day of the year to publicise the needs and achievements of blind people everywhere. What follows is an appreciation of Peguilly d'Herbemont, the French woman who was responsible for introducing the white cane 60 years ago. She was a lady of French high society who devoted much of her time and fortune to the welfare of the blind.

1921 - James Biggs of Bristol (as he claims in New Beacon article, Dec. 1937, pp. 320/321) thought of idea of painting his stick white -- wrote to various institutions, Chief Constables, newspapers, magazines, etc...

1931 - February - Mlle Guilly d'Herbemont, with the assistance of one of the editors of l'Echo de Paris launched national white stick movement in France.

1931 - Taken up by British Press - West Ham Rotary Club's offer to supply white sticks to blind people in the area accepted - in May, the BBC broadcast the suggestion that all blind persons should be provided with a white stick, which should be nationally recognised by the public

1932 - National Institute for the Blind started stocking and selling white sticks

HELEN KELLER was born in Tuscumbia, Alabama on June 27, 1880. Her infancy was normal until, at a year and a half of age, she contracted meningitis. The disease rendered her both deaf and blind. The next years were hellish for her family, as they knew of no way to reach through her double disabilities to communicate with her. As for herself, she was imprisoned in her body, and lonely, unable to make her needs and desires known.

SOUTH AFRICAN NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR THE BLIND
The South African National Council for the Blind (Council) is a Non-Government Organisation (NGO) striving to meet the needs of all blind and partially sighted people in South Africa.

Our services include rehabilitation, education and training, the provision of assistive devices, social and economic development and programmes promoting the prevention of blindness and the restoration of sight.

Council, with its Head Office situated in Pretoria, comprises 95 affiliated member organisations which share Councils goal of providing services to visually impaired people across South Africa, approximately 90% of whom come from previously disadvantaged groups.

Councils management is made up of a dedicated and diversified team, fully compliant with BEE standards, who strive to maintain Councils vision and to keep the promise we have made in this, our 80th year of service Sustainability, Equality, Empowerment: S.E.E.